Daredevil: The Punisher and Elektra Will Make Matt Murdock Question His Role as a Hero

Marvel’s Daredevil is returning to Netflix on March 18th and today at the TCA (Television Critics Association) press tour, the executive producers and cast spoke about the new season – and the notable introductions of The Punisher and Elektra.

Jon Bernthal (The Walking Dead), who’s playing Frank Castle/The Punisher, said he felt the Punisher is “a wonderful fit for the world" of Daredevil, praising the cast and crew who, in Season 1, “presented this world that was so authentic and so gritty. And I really feel it's the perfect world to reintroduce this character. I think, for me, since so much of Season 1 was about Matt sort of dealing with this decision to be a hero, I think here comes this guy who, you know, he's really not concerned with that, about being a hero”

Said Bernthal, “If I got one thing from the comics, I think, as far as superpowers... his superpower is his rage. His superpower is that he is not going to quit, and he is going to go forward no matter what. And that's as human and grounded a quality as I think as this sort of genre could have, and I think that is the perfect show to introduce a character like that.”

Said Elodie Yung (Elektra), “What I tried to capture by reading the comics is I wanted to keep the coldness that Elektra has. And I had conversations at length with Doug [Petrie] and Marco [Ramirez]. We think Elektra is kind of a sociopath. This world is a game for her. It's like a chess game, and what motivates her is what she wants. She'll use anything she needs to use to get to her goal, and if she needs to kill people, she would. She has this coldness and this sociopath in her, and I tried to keep that, really. But, on the other hand, we wanted to create a character with different layers. I think Elektra isn't a bad person. She's not a good person. She's a person with different traits, with layers, and she's seeking for who she is. So, really, in this season, there's an arc to her story, and hopefully, we'll find out who she is really by the end of it.”

While viewers will see Frank Castle from the beginning of the season, Elektra shows up a bit later. Said co-showrunner Marco Ramirez, “We wanted to mix in one ingredient at a time. I think one of the pitfalls when we have this many great characters to play with is wanting to throw them at the wall at the same time and say, like, ‘Look at all of the fun stuff we have’ I mean, it was an exercise in patience, surely, as two huge fans, to actually try to hold back and say, ‘Let's be very careful about this. Let's make sure that even people who aren't aware of who Elektra and Punisher are will be with us on this journey."’ So it's mostly about finding the strongest journey for Matt Murdock to go on and then letting these two characters get into the water with him at the right time for his journey.”

The question came up about Elektra’s costume and Yung joked, “I do wear clothes.”

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Noted co-showrunner Douglas Petrie, regarding the costume question, “The short answer is you are going to have to watch, but we were very, very aware of it. What we were thinking first and foremost were two questions. One was, what looks cool? We love the comics… and can we do that? And then, also, in terms of bringing Elodie in and kind of her martial arts training, which is so evident in what she does and who she is as a character, what would you really fight in? What would protect you? And, also, Elektra isn't just about protection. She's a little bit of a stylist. So we threw all of that into the mix.”

Added Ramirez, “Anything like a comic book costume, to us... The fun part of the challenge is making it organically feel part of the world; part of the tapestry of the world that exists already in Season 1. So will people be wearing kick ass costumes in this show? At some point, everybody does. We promise. But, that said, we want to make them feel as organic and grounded as possible.”

In Season 1, Matt Murdock had to decide how far he was willing to go and if he was willing to kill in his new role as a costumed vigilante – ultimately deciding not to. Regarding how Season 2 will test the title character, Charlie Cox (Matt Murdock/Daredevil) noted, “Season 2 begins and a period of time has passed. With Wilson Fisk in jail, the crime rate has plummeted. Daredevil is looking after his town, his Hell's Kitchen, pretty well, and things have kind of returned to normal, if not better than normal."

Cox said that Matt has reconciled “a lot of the arguments in his mind about who he is, what he is, what he's capable of, how much of a right he has to do what he's doing,” only for Frank Castle’s arrival and his methods to have a great impact on him.

Explained Cox, “The world is then presented with someone who forces Matt to question everything that he is, because if people are going to draw parallels between him and Frank Castle, if the world is going to do that -- and, certainly, there's no way that [Matt] can agree with the methods with which Frank Castle employs his vigilante justice -- then it means that Matt has to reevaluate who he is and what he does and whether what he's doing is helpful or detrimental to the society in which he lives.”

Petrie explained that Daredevil: Season 2 would look at the idea of “What is it to be a hero?”

Said Petrie, “Season 1 is the guy becomes a hero, and now what are you going to do? And I think that addresses the costume as well, because he was hiding in the shadows in year 1, and now he's kind of openly, from the very beginning, going, ‘Hey, New York, here I am. You've got to deal with me now, good and bad.’ And Frank Castle and Elektra, the reason that these two are the perfect choices for right now with 'What is it to be a hero?’ is that Frank Castle comes and really stirs the pot. ‘Oh, you're going to do this? I'm going to do this too. I'm not that different. You're not superior. There's little difference between us.’ And that little difference is an enormous moral chasm that is kind of the engine for the season - that and Elektra's differences as well.”